Founder Journeys
There are great stories out there that need to be told
One of the things I always talk about (and get asked about) during talks and panels is the founder journey. How did founders come up with a certain product, what was their journey? Where did they discover the problem they are solving? Did they work in the industry, or did they just stumble upon it? Or is it more complicated? And why is it so important for investors?
The better and the more authentic the story, the likelier the chances we are looking at a great start-up that will get funded and scale. And they need to be personal. We need to understand what founders are about, what motivates them, what they do in their spare time and how they live. I was reminded of that today when Penny AI founder David Abbey send around a very nice summary with lots of photos of how his Squamish-based company got going. It is a very personal story told by his wife Teri Lynn. Read the story here. Penny has developed and launched a digital assistant/sales platform for both individual and corporate users and started a few years ago. They successfully raised angel funds and closed an institutional round last year and are now growing rapidly with a great team. The key to understanding the progress is the founding story. Enjoy it. We need more companies to spell that out for us the way Penny just did.